"In Canada, February is Black History Month. But which blacks? "

Tribune. A few years ago, when I was a teacher at a high school in Toronto, I received a call from a Radio-Canada reporter. He wanted to know what I thought about Black History Month and what my school planned to do there. My answer was that I was not convinced of the advisability of such a celebration every February and that I would not participate in it. His amazement prevented the discussion from going any further.

Looking back, I think I should have been tactful in expressing my point of view. For example, I could have asked him to clarify which black people he was referring to. We are again in February. In North America, especially in the United States and Canada, it’s Black History Month again, during which is underlined "The heritage of black Canadians, yesterday and today", as stated on the website of Canadian Heritage, the equivalent of a department of culture. Campuses invite black speakers to discuss the contribution of black people to society. Schools and museums try not to be outdone.

If one cannot doubt the noble intentions behind these efforts, the temptation remains to ask the question: what black people are we talking about? In his work The Assignment. Blacks don't exist (Grasset, 2018), French novelist and journalist Tania de Montaigne explains in a clear, didactic and humorous style that talking about "blacks" is an essentialist vision based on old clichés tending to make believe that all black people are alike , have the same culture, and therefore the same history. From this perspective, the celebration of Black History Month could result from an insidious form of racism.

"Color takes on a capital letter"

Indeed, while it would come to nobody the idea to confuse a Portuguese, a Russian and an Iranian, who nevertheless all have the same skin color, it seems difficult for "white" people to admit that people of he Haitian, Jamaican or Senegalese origin have their distinctive features linked to their history, their languages, their culture. The racialist theses propagated by the British philosopher David Hume (Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects, 1777), then by the French diplomat and writer Arthur de Gobineau (Essay on the inequality of human races, 1853) continue to nourish unconsciously many clichés. Witness the famous Dakar speech of Sarkozy in 2007 in which the former French president asserted in a peremptory tone that "Africa has not made history enough", an Africa, of course, that does not include Egypt.

We substantiate the adjective "black", whereas we would not do it, rightly so, for the adjective "yellow" in reference to the inhabitants of the Asian continent. We substantiate the adjective "black", as we would for a nationality. We substantiate the adjective "black", because it suffices to know one to pretend to know them all. For Tania de Montaigne, the idea of ​​race is so ingrained in people's minds that "The color takes on a capital letter, we no longer say a black one, but a black one". This author dissects in her book many clichés that she had to face since her childhood. French, born in Paris, for many of her compatriots, she is above all black, therefore Black. She is therefore part of the "tribe" of "Blacks", who laugh in a hilarious way, know how to dance, sing, run, but not swim.

However, it should be noted, once again, that these cliches exist even in the most benevolent minds. Doesn't Radio France International have a program called "The Epic of Black Music"? Most American universities have their "Black studies". Canada's Michaëlle Jean, former secretary general of La Francophonie, is the guest of honor at the National Black Canadians Summit, to be held March 21-22, 2020 in Halifax. One thus blithely confuses skin color, identities and cultures. Which is very simplistic. And yet, who would dare to think that René Depestre is more "Haitian" than Franckétienne? Who would dare to exclude Alan Paton from the South African literary pantheon?

Hell is not necessarily other people. Many black people see Black History Month as an opportunity to showcase themselves. Their pride is palpable. Amalgams are accepted or stored in the cupboard. We invent heroes. So-and-so was a famous musician. Another, a sportsman with unequaled talents. Another occupied high administrative office. As if these evocations were enough to erase social inequalities, discrimination in hiring or even the insecurities that persist in people clumsily called "colored".

Deconstruction of myths

This effervescence is understandable, however, provided that it is placed in its historical context. The celebration has its origins in the United States. At the behest of Carter G. Woodson, a prominent writer, Black History Week first took place in February 1926. From one week, we went to a month. February was chosen as a tribute to Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln, two notable figures in the history of the abolition of slavery in the United States. The goal then was to encourage the study of African American history. Slavery, segregation and struggles for emancipation and civil rights are markers of identity that have shaped the history of African Americans. The descendants of slaves in the United States have chosen to identify themselves other than by the color of their skin. They have an identity: they are African-Americans, Sino-Americans, Indo-Americans or Latin-Americans.

The legitimacy of celebrating this identity, this history, is obvious. What is less so is this grabbing seen everywhere else, especially in Canada. There is a minority in the province of Nova Scotia made up of descendants of slaves. Suffice to say that these people are of ancient origin. Can the story to be celebrated be the same for them as for a Canadian of Malian or Kenyan origin whose immigration is more recent? What place is reserved in these festivities for Métis, those whose parents have a different skin color? So should it be ended?

This would be neither desirable nor possible. However, we should give ourselves the means to prevent and combat the pernicious effects, including essentialism and categorization, that such a celebration entails. Explain, for example, as Tania de Montaigne did that "Black people don't exist", even if there are people of black complexion; that the black race does not exist, but that there is a human race, as the German philosopher Emmanuel Kant pointed out in On the different human races published in 1775 and the Haitian intellectual Joseph Anténor Firmin in Equality of human races published in 1885. And if the month of February is not enough to carry out such a deconstruction of myths, there should be no qualms about using it all year round. Didn't Einstein say that"It is easier to disintegrate an atom than a prejudice" ?